"Which is more important to New York
City's economy, the gleaming corporate office--or
the grungy rock club that launches the best new
bands? If you said "office," think again. In The
Warhol Economy, Elizabeth Currid argues that
creative industries like fashion, art, and music
drive the economy of New York as much as--if not
more than--finance, real estate, and law. And these
creative industries are fueled by the social life
that whirls around the clubs, galleries, music
venues, and fashion shows where creative people meet,
network, exchange ideas, pass judgments, and set the
trends that shape popular culture.
The
implications of Currid's argument are far-reaching,
and not just for New York. Urban policymakers, she
suggests, have not only seriously underestimated the
importance of the cultural economy, but they have
failed to recognize that it depends on a vibrant
creative social scene. They haven't understood, in
other words, the social, cultural, and economic mix
that Currid calls the Warhol economy.
With vivid
first-person reporting about New York's creative
scene, Currid takes the reader into the city spaces
where the social and economic lives of creativity
merge. The book has fascinating original interviews
with many of New York's important creative figures,
including fashion designers Zac Posen and Diane von
Furstenberg, artists Ryan McGinness and Futura, and
members of the band Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.
The economics
of art and culture in New York and other cities has
been greatly misunderstood and underrated. The
Warhol Economy explains how the cultural economy
works-and why it is vital to all great cities."
